Crawford Perspectives

While not an easy read, we find much wisdom and perspective in Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s book, The Black Swan. The central thesis of the book revolves around the idea that a relatively small number of low-probability, high-impact events have dictated the course of human history. Taleb cleverly refers to these …

Lee Eisenberg’s The Number is not your typical book on investing. The key takeaways we have chosen to highlight are not necessarily the central premise of the book, but the author does introduce several concepts that resonate with us here at Crawford. It’s a fun read, and it’s certainly oriented …

The recent acquisition of Alexion Pharmaceuticals provides an opportunity to affirm our AstraZeneca investment expectations. Developing a set of differentiated fundamental expectations that are codified in an investment thesis for each company is an important component of the Crawford Investment Counsel investing process. AstraZeneca remains one of our preferred stocks …

The Crawford Investment Counsel (CIC) Small Cap strategy aims to deliver attractive investment returns over the long run while reducing the volatility associated with investing at the lower end of the market capitalization range. We strive to accomplish this objective by constructing a portfolio of what we believe to be …

Utilities meet several objectives within Crawford Investment Counsel portfolios, including attractive current income with low earnings variability as well as a growing environmental, social, and governance (ESG) focus. The consistency found within utilities is a function of the fact that it is a regulated industry that enjoys fairly constant and …

Crawford Investment Counsel (CIC) is focused on what we believe to be high-quality securities. The dividend is an attractive and necessary feature of our investment process. This is because we believe income or yield is a factor that gives value to stocks, and perhaps most importantly, because we think dividends …

The overall direction of the domestic economy is determined by many factors, not the least of which are monetary and fiscal policy. In recent years monetary policy has been the dominant influence on the economy, but for several reasons the emphasis is shifting to the fiscal side. Because of the …

Anyone with even a passing interest in the stock market is aware of the GameStop saga that is going on in the market. It is all over the news. With this short message we will attempt to put the episode in perspective. GameStop is a weak company that is currently …

John Maynard Keynes was a 20th Century economist most famous for his work on economic cycles. His revolutionary idea for the government to lower interest rates in order to increase demand and stimulate employment set the foundation for current monetary and fiscal policy. In The General Theory of Employment, Interest …

The Dividend Growth strategy is a high-quality equity portfolio. As the firm’s flagship portfolio, it represents a pure implementation of the company investment philosophy. This philosophy is based on over 50 years of implementation and is grounded in the belief that more consistent, predictable companies can be effectively identified by …